Is This CPU Good for Basic NAS?

[Sa1tama]

Hello!

I wanna build a very basic NAS for just photos and videos, so I wonder if Q8400 is good enough. 

Thanks in advance!

[komar]

Yeah it is.

I don't know how you want to set up that NAS but the easiest way would be windows 7 or 10 and share some folders to everyone on the home/group network. The Q8400 would be enough.

[Sa1tama]

1 minute ago, komar said:

Yeah it is.

I don't know how you want to set up that NAS but the easiest way would be windows 7 or 10 and share some folders to everyone on the home/group network. The Q8400 would be enough.

Ummm... I thought FreeNas was the best choice. Can it handle this OS???

 

[komar]

Just now, _SAITAMA_ said:

Ummm... I thought FreeNas was the best choice. Can it handle this OS???

 

Can Intel Q8400 support Windows 10?

LOL

Yes, yes it does.

 

I don't know about FreeNas, but what I'm proposing is just simple windows instalation and right clicking on a folder to make it shared - doubt it would be easier than this.

[Guest]

Storing video, not transcoding, right?

[Electronics Wizardy]

12 minutes ago, _SAITAMA_ said:

Hello!

I wanna build a very basic NAS for just photos and videos, so I wonder if Q8400 is good enough. 

Thanks in advance!

yea its more than enough cpu for a nas. Problem is there pretty power hungry, so it will be cheaper to get a low power new system most of the time.

[grimreeper132]

20 minutes ago, komar said:

Can Intel Q8400 support Windows 10?

LOL

Yes, yes it does.

 

I don't know about FreeNas, but what I'm proposing is just simple windows instalation and right clicking on a folder to make it shared - doubt it would be easier than this.

The requirements for free nas are as follows

 

Quote

• 64-bit hardware is required for current FreeNAS releases. Intel processors are strongly recommended.
• 8 GB of RAM is required, with more recommended.
• FreeNAS 9.2.1.9 was the last release that supported 32-bit hardware and UFS filesystems.
• SSDs, SATADOMs, or USB sticks can be used for boot devices. SSDs are recommended.
• 8 GB of RAM is the absolute minimum requirement. 1 GB per terabyte of storage is a standard starting point for calculating additional RAM needs, although actual needs vary. ECC RAM is strongly recommended.
• Directly-connected storage disks are necessary for FreeNAS to provide fault tolerance. Hardware RAID cards are not recommended because they prevent this direct access and reduce reliability. For best results, see FreeBSD Hardware Compatibility List for supported HBA disk controllers. LSI/Avago/Broadcom HBAs are the best choice with FreeNAS.
• NAS-specific hard drives like WD Red are recommended.
• Intel or Chelsio 1 GbE or 10 GbE Ethernet cards are recommended.

http://www.freenas.org/hardware-requirements/

 

So yes it does support it in theory, how ever the 8GB of RAM means you will need to get 4X2GB sticks or 2X4GB, or it will not work nicely. Theoretically possible with less but it's a requirement for a reason so I suggest using 8GB. 

 

I would recommend trying it see if it works, and if it doesn't get an old server off ebay or similar e.g. I recently bought "36 pounds of power" for £36, (inc. postage) which has 2 X E5520 and 12GB of RAM which is not actually that expensive and an xeon CPU is preferred over a non-xeon in this case because of ECC, and support from intel lasts longer etc. as people pay more to get them and such expect the longer support (one of the few reasons that make the xeon W lines actually make some sense, but only some. 

 

(the W-2135 for example makes sense compared to the 8700K for it's ECC support, quad channel RAM and longer support period, E-2186M is it's xeon rival which only has dual channel which for simulation makes it pointless))

[Salv8 (sam)]

if you want a basic NAS that does nothing else but store data, a prebuilt NAS unit would be your best option then a full desktop

they don't have a lot of expandability so keep that in mind but here is one i recommend getting:

https://www.amazon.com/QNAP-TS-431-US-Personal-1-4GHzDual/dp/B00S0XV1NE/ref=sr_1_14?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1529901352&sr=1-14&keywords=NAS&refinements=p_n_feature_keywords_two_browse-bin%3A6792680011

it's got quite a bit built in for $260 USD

chuck some HDD's in there and you have yourself a NAS

if you need help choosing storage for it, tell us and we can help

[Spotty]

It'll be fine for general file storage. Native video playback should also be fine, though if you are trying to transcode video or playback 4k video then you may have issues.

[beersykins]

As per others, some comparatively high power consumption compared to newer alternatives (Q8400 is almost 10 years old now).

 

Otherwise plenty of oomph for RAID/ZFS/parity-calculations or some light transcoding tasks.